My week ahead, 26 January - 1 February 2015

Monday 26 January, 4pm – Culture portfolio meeting
6pm – Labour Group meeting

Wednesday 28 January, 6pm – Ipswich Borough Full Council meeting

Thursday 29 January, 6pm –Ipswich Borough Council Scrutiny meeting

Saturday 31 January, 10am – Labour campaigning in North East Ipswich

Sunday 1 February, 11am – Labour campaigning in South East Ipswich

Busy week ahead and I also hope to get over to the County Council to support the parents who will be letting the Tory County Council know how angry and let down they feel after the Tories have ignored their own consultation and decided to close a number of Children’s Centres in Suffolk including two in Ipswich.

Now if your only news source was our local Tory MP or one of the few remaining Tory councillors you may be surprised to hear that our children’s centres are closing as they have decided not to mention it! Eventually when asked via twitter a few Tories have answered, one to deny the centres were even closing!

The Tory leader tweeted that it was just still a plan and nothing had happened yet, well what has happened is the Tories have put off the decision once and we can’t see them doing so again.

They are going to shut two Children’s Centres in Ipswich; some local blogs have attempted to pass the closures off as mergers (showing their true blue colours as they seem towish yo act as apologists for our Tory MP).Even saying that some of the new buildings they will be using are closer to the users than the Centre due to be closed. Try explaining that to parents on Whitton Estate who are now expected to travel down Norwich Road, cross at one of the busiest junctions in Ipswich to visit their ‘new merged’ centre in Chevalier Street (one of the worst streets in Ipswich when it comes to air pollution)

Now our Tory MP, Ben Gummer has not tweeted about the closures (mergers?) or used his blog to tell us his thoughts – now he often ignores bad news but he has always seemed quite keen on Children’s Centres – he even at the last General Election ambushed a Labour Minister after Labour said centres would close under the Tories (which we now see is true) and recently in a blog, Ben Gummer declared that “Everyone must get great childcare – not just the well-off”.

So his silence on the subject is disappointing, he even had the opportunity to explain to Ipswich residents why he thinks the centres should close via his weekly column in the local paper, instead we received a lecture on urban planning.
From all his promises of putting party loyalty behind him and just doing what is best for Ipswich residents he has shown with this issue that he is like many MPs in Westminster, happy to take credit for anything good and hiding when the news is not so bright.
So far this year he has failed to tell us via his column, website, blog or tweets what he thinks are the reasons for poor inspection reports at two of our academy schools and now the closure of Children’s Centres.

So expect his columns over the next 101 days to cover subjects such as the town centre, empty shops and trains then he will move onto the town centre, empty shops and trains and he will finish with the town centre, empty shops and trains.

Mr Gummer, your Government aided and abetted by a Tory County Council are failing our children – get your head out of the sand!